Tristan parked the car and turned the engine off. Silence overtook as the young man looked at the house in front of which he had stopped. He was tired. Hours of having flown from London, followed by driving all the way from the airport, were of course part of the reason of his exhaustion – but so were hours of flipping through his mind again and again, the words he'll say to the girl he had made such a long way to meet. But despite his frantic, hurried journey, now, as he sat there, he was simply too terrified to get in.
This is it, the words passed his mind as he reached for his coat, on the seat next to him. He put it in his lap, but stayed still. Outside there were no particular sounds or noises, except than the occasional chirping of birds; no music was played, no people were laughing. He had sat twice at that same spot before this night, yet again not having the nerve to get out and walk the short road to the door – only that now the house looked grim. Sad. He shook his head; he was mostly a logical man, and he was probably just imagining it... but the feeling overtook him and he dreaded getting out. He didn't want to see her like that, and damn his good intentions.
His cowardness overtooking, he recalled what got him there at the first place; Paris had called him, his cellphone intruding a family dinner he was happy to get out of. He berated himself now for being so pleased at hearing her voice, which had liberated him of his hated family duties. It took him no more than two seconds to realize that something was wrong, as Paris started rambling about how he should stay calm and collected and think rationally – he remembered her using that term, rationally - and how there's nothing he could possibly do, so acting crazy was... and he cut her off right then and joked about her new tendency of not finishing her thoughts. And when she did finish her thought, telling him whatever details she could before he hung up and called the DuGrey's travelling agent, cutting his vacation short, he wished that she hadn't.
He sighed and again looked at her house. Should the light in one of the rooms hadn't been flicked on, he would've probably just countinued sitting there for hours to come. But so it was that it was flicked on, and before having a chance of regretting it, he got up and shut the car door behind him.
"And all I could think of," she says and her voice is thickening at the thought, "was that it's fall. It's fall, you see—" she suddenly looks up at him, and she seems startled, almost as if she had forgotten he had ever walked into her house that late, breezy autumn night and took her breath away. She shakes her head slightly and takes her hand out of his grasp, breathing heavily and not finding the exact words to convey her feelings. And her hair is all messed up but she doesn't actually care that much; she tries to get it out of her eyes and her hands linger at the top of her head a moment more. She looks so incredibly desperate, completely at a loss of words. Words, her reliable counterpart, are betraying her now and it feels as if the ground is slipping from beneath her. And she suddenly feels so tired of having that same feeling on repeat ever since Saturday night.
She gets up and hurries off, walking towards the window and opening it. "You see?" she then asks weakly. He's not looking outside, he looks at the agonizing girl standing right in front of him. He doesn't have to look out the window in order to find out what it is he has to see. A thought flashes through his mind—and it's as quick as lightning and as thick as water—he thinks to himself, that he sees her. But he would linger upon that later on, for she continues. "It's just cool air and it's not..." – her voice is merely a whisper now – "it's not snowing." A beat, and she returns, anger creeping in. "It isn't snowing and it isn't fair."
"Rory," he says, his voice soft. The girl leans against the wall.
"My mom died and the one thing I keep thinking about is, that it isn't snowing." She looks straight into his eyes for the whole time and is bewildered by the concept of him holding her gaze. She looks into his eyes and sees no pity, only... only sorrow so deep she's afraid she might drown in, and something else she had already knew was to be found there whenever he was looking at her.
He stands up at once and walks towards her. Urgently he walks, and at the sound of his methodic steps nearing her, she starts crying for the first time ever since her mother stepped into that car. He gets there in time to hold her before she falls to the floor, and both of them sit there pressed against the wall of Lorelai's bedroom and against each other. She sobs, desperately so, and clings to the fabric of his shirt. He holds her tight and minutes pass them by, perhaps hours. He whispers words of condolences softly into her ear and prays that morning will come bearing hope and comfort. At last she falls asleep and he soon follows her lead.